ojwhittington

Let me first start by saying, for the longest time I didn't like the A8, the styling and interior never impressed me as much as an S class.

BUT ! The new generation has completely changed my mind, I test drove a long wheel base 50 TDI over the weekend and don't have anything bad to say about it what so ever.

• It is incredibly smooth on the road, in my opinion it absorbs the road better than an S class.
• The base engine is really good; It's smooth, plenty of power and doesn't feel slow at all ( even though it's a long wheel base ), and diesel is fairly efficient.
• The interior is simply amazing. Down in the Audi basement before the car was bought up I had a change to see the colour ambient lighting, Amazing, pleasant and not distracting.
• Quality is unrivalled, interior leather is soft, build is solid no squeaks or rattles anywhere.
• Exterior lighting looks amazing at night. Especially OLED rear lights.

Who ever is on the fence about buying one, go for it !

angrypengu

1) How is the sound system in the one you're in? It's the B&O Premium one I think, no tweeters.
2) Any thing that went wrong? Any quirks? Issues? System glitches?

THANK YOU FOR SHARING!! I can't wait to drive this myself.

ojwhittington

1) The sound system was just the standard B&O 3D (17 Speakers). It sounded pretty amazing, I used bluetooth and listen to radio and my music was loud and deep, good base and lots of customisation. Wonder what the advanced 3D would sound like lol.

2) Nothing went wrong at all, I've seen a thread where some new a8's have had many issues but the one I drove was perfect. They will have updates to fix those problems soon in the future anyway.

I forgot to mention the new MMI Touch interface, I didn't like it at first but after driving the car its not that hard to use, and everything can be done with VC so it really doesn't make a huge difference.

angrypengu

Thank you. Here's a few more.

1) In the D4, tire noise was pretty bad. Is that still the case?
2) Efficacy of the massage seats? Equal, better, or worse than the D4?

Thanks!

ojwhittington

Tire noise is not an issue. Cabin noise is minimal I think it might be a thicker glass than normal.

I can’t compare the seats to the old a8 but the new one seems pretty balanced. Again there was lots of customisation so you can chose how you want it to feel.

angrypengu

Thanks - yes, acoustic glass is either an option or standard depending on geography.

For Q2, I was just referring to the massage function. Don't know if you tried it in the D5 and can compare it with the D4, but it's top on my mind and thought I'd ask :-) That said once it lands here I'll post a detailed review myself of the D5!

bravo659

I'm about to change my mind and get one.
just don't want to have any issues.
what city you're in?

angrypengu

He drove a diesel. He's not in N. America.

bravo659

thanks.
the car looks great.

angrypengu

Can you please share what changed your mind? I'm still on the fence and I will obviously make up my decision when I do my own test drive, but what about this changed your mind?